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Stellar

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As much as I long for the city sometimes, country nights like tonight fill me with awe. Cold – frozen in fact – but so clear, all the stars visible. I spent an hour in the darkness sitting on the deck upstairs just staring into the sky, view obscured occasionally by my breath visibly floating through the air.

A few years ago, ML “gave” me an app for identifying constellations, so for basically the first time in all those years, I used it, halfheartedly. I am always a bit awestruck by the cosmos and my tiny place in this universe. Particularly when it’s so cold, I feel so small and insignificant. The awesome nature of being enveloped by this endless expanse of stars renders all of life’s trivialities insignificant as well; you know, when you’re trapped in your own head, listing off all the things you need to do, all the things you don’t want to deal with, think about, feel – it all retreats to some other place in the brain – a place far from immediate thought and anxiety.

Perhaps I have been brainwashed by my descent into the nature-oriented New Agey books I just completed (hallelujah), which seemed to emphasize the importance of a relationship with nature and the universe as key to our ability to mature as adults. Maybe there’s something to it. But I know I’ve always felt this way when walking or sitting in the dark on clear, cold, starry nights. Infinitesimal but brimming with excitement, wonder and hope.